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Master thesis
Predicting and evaluating participation in ICT forms of
victim-offender mediation
J. van Dijk
Supervisors
Dr. S. Zebel
Dr. E.G. Ufkes
August 6, 2016
UNIVERSITY OF TWENTE.
restorative healing
reconciliation
justice forgiveness
vict
im
off
end
er
relationships
pea
ce
support responsibility
med
iati
on
i
Master thesis
Predicting and evaluating participation in ICT forms of
victim-offender mediation
Student
Jiska van Dijk
S1313851
University of Twente
Faculty behavorial, management and social sciences
Master psychology Conflict, Risk and Safety
First supervisor: Dr. S. Zebel
Second supervisor: Dr. E.G. Ufkes
Enschede, The Netherlands
August 6, 2016
UNIVERSITY OF TWENTE.
ii
Acknowledgements
After an intensive period of eight months it is finally time to write the last part of my thesis: the
acknowledgements. Writing this thesis was a period in which I learned a lot and in which I
experienced growth on both personal and educational level. It has been a rocky road sometimes,
but overall it has been a great process. Even though I got a lot of independence creating and writing
this research, I could not have done it without the help of some very important people.
First of all I would like to thank my first supervisor Sven Zebel, whose contribution to my
thesis has been of great importance. Even though he was my supervisor and academic teacher and
I experienced the process as a great learning process, I also experienced it as a great collaboration.
By exchanging thoughts and ideas my thesis gained more depth and content. It was very motivating
to have such an enthusiastic supervisor. I would also like to thank my second supervisor Elze Ufkes
for his critical view and feedback during the process. Someone also very important in this process
has been Dieter Kosters. I want to thank him for his time and dedication in helping to create my
research instrument.
I would also like to thank my parents and Jonathan. It was very nice to have people around
me who asked on a regular basis how I was doing. It kept me motivated by just talking about my
research and findings. Jonathan thank you for your supporting words when I was doubting myself
and thank you for being the one I could go to when I needed some relaxation.
iii
Abstract (ENG)
This research was conducted to examine the role of the need to restore the feelings of agency, the
need for information, the emotional need and the need to mentally cope with the crime on the
willingness to participate in VOM and the preference for (new and existing) communication forms.
The effects of an apology given through the different communication channels on the feelings of
fear and anger among victims were examined.
It was expected that people with higher needs, prefer a richer form of communication, but
this relation would be influenced negatively by strong feelings of fear and the estimation that the
offender would be insincere. It was also expected that for victims perceiving the apology as richer,
feelings of fear and anger declined more. We expected that the perceived sincerity of the apology
would mediate this relationship.
Participants imagined being a victim by reading a scenario of a violent robbery. The
possibility of VOM was explained and participants choose if they were willing to participate and
which form of communication they preferred. Subsequently they received an apology of the
offender through the preferred communication channel. Participants who were not willing to
participate were randomly assigned to one of the communication forms.
Results showed that the need for information is a strong predictor for participation in
mediation. When an apology was perceived as richer, the feelings of fear and anger declined more
strongly and this relation was explained by a higher perceived sincerity of the offender. When
people involuntary participated in VOM their feelings of fear and anger declined less, because they
perceived the apology as less sincere in comparison to people who voluntary participated.
This research is a good starting point for future research about new communication forms
in VOM, because online forms of communication show promising effects.
iv
Abstract (NL)
Dit onderzoek werd uitgevoerd om te onderzoeken wat de rol is van de behoefte om macht te
herstellen, de behoefte aan informatie, de emotionele behoefte en de behoefte om het misdrijf te
verwerken op de bereidheid om deel te nemen aan bemiddeling en welke (nieuwe of bestaande)
communicatievorm geprefereerd wordt. De effecten van een excuus gegeven via de verschillende
communicatievormen zijn onderzocht.
Er werd verwacht dat participanten met hogere behoeftes een rijkere vorm van
communicatie prefereren, maar dat deze relatie negatief werd beïnvloed door gevoelens van angst
en de inschatting van de oprechtheid van de dader. Ook werd verwacht dat voor mensen die het
excuus als rijker ervoeren, de gevoelens van angst en woede meer daalden en dat deze relatie werd
verklaard doordat het excuus als oprechter werd ervaren.
Participanten moesten zich inleven in een slachtofferrol door het lezen van een scenario
over een gewelddadige overval. De mogelijkheid van bemiddeling werd uitgelegd en de
participanten kozen of ze deel wilden nemen en via welke communicatievorm. Daarna ontvingen
ze een excuus van de dader via de communicatievorm van hun voorkeur. Participanten die niet
wilden deelnemen aan bemiddeling werden random toegedeeld aan een van de
communicatievormen.
Resultaten lieten zien dat de behoefte aan informatie een belangrijke voorspeller is voor
deelname in bemiddeling. Ook blijkt dat wanneer een excuus werd gezien als rijker, de gevoelens
van angst en woede meer daalden en deze relatie werd verklaard door een hogere ervaren
oprechtheid van het excuus. Wanneer mensen onvrijwillig deelnamen, daalden de gevoelens van
angst en woede minder, doordat ze het excuus als minder oprecht ervoeren.
Dit onderzoek is een goed beginpunt voor vervolgonderzoek naar nieuwe online vormen
van communicatie in het bemiddelingsproces, omdat de online vormen van communicatie
veelbelovende resultaten laten zien.
1
Introduction
Slachtoffer in Beeld (SiB or Victim in Focus) is a Dutch organization that provides victim-offender
mediation (VOM). Their goal is to help victims and offenders of criminal offences to cope with
the crime, by giving the offender and the victim the opportunity to talk to each other, either through
face-to-face communication, letter exchange or through shuttle mediation1. In this way they strive
for mutual respect and contribute to the emotional restoration for both victim and offender
(Slachtoffer in Beeld, 2015). Participation is completely voluntary and SiB supports and guides if
necessary.
This way of helping people to process the offense, is based on restorative justice. In
restorative justice the key players are directly involved parties of the crime- the victim, offender
and their families (Roach, 2000). The goal is bringing offenders and victims together to make clear
that wrong has been done and to provide some sort of restoration (Roach, 2000). It is giving the
conflict back to the direct parties: victim and offender.
VOM is an example of restorative justice and has promising effects. Most of the victims
and offenders who participated in VOM were satisfied with the process (Latimer, Dowden &
Muise, 2005; Umbreit, Coates & Roberts, 2000). Another positive effect seems to be a reduction
in the amount of fear victims have towards the offender (Umbreit et. al., 2000). Zebel (2012) and
Umbreit (1991) found the same results and they also concluded that victims display a reduction in
anger towards the offender. Note that Zebel (2012) found the effect on anger only when face-to-
face mediation occurred.
Despite these positive effects, more than 50 percent of the applications for VOM do not
lead to mediation (Zebel, 2012). Participation rates vary between 40 and 60 percent (Umbreit et.
al., 2004). One reason why people decline face-to- face mediation, could be because they belief
that direct contact is to confronting (Shapland et. al., 2007). However direct forms of mediation
seem to have a more positive effect than indirect forms of mediation (Zebel, 2012). It is a challenge
to understand why people participate and what the effects are, so the process can be adjusted to
the needs victims and offenders have.
Recent technological developments make it able to communicate through online platforms,
such as video calling. To test if these online communication forms provide the best of both worlds-
the effects of direct forms of communication without the confrontation of meeting the offender-
this research examines new forms of communication within the victim-offender mediation process.
This research will be answering the following research questions: In what way do psychological
needs determine which form of communication is preferred during mediation? And what are the
effects of an apology given through different communication forms?
Getting an answer to the research questions is important for different reasons. First of all
this research examines new possible reasons why victims are or are willing to participate in VOM,
which will contribute to theory. It is the first research that examines the effects of new
1 Shuttle mediation: a mediatior gives the message from one party (the offender) to the other party (the victim). The
victim and offender do not have direct contact with eachother.
2
communication forms within VOM. It is also important for institutions like SiB. They can facilitate
mediation processes that better fit the needs of victims which may lead to better successes in VOM
and more participation.
In the remainder of this introduction participation and non-participation in relation to the
different psychological needs victims have will be examined. After this the new forms of mediation
will be analyzed based on the media-richness theory. Then the importance of the apology during
mediation will be explained.
Victims’ needs
Before restorative justice was introduced in contemporary criminal justice systems, the justice
system used a retributive justice paradigm (Wenzel, Okimoto, Feather & Platow, 2008). The main
difference is that in the former the state was viewed as the primary victim and the offender and
direct victim had a passive role. Restorative justice makes sure that the direct involved parties have
an active role instead (Bradshaw et. al., 2006; Roach, 2000; Umbreit, 1991). Victim-offender
mediation is an example of restorative justice, which is primarily dialogue driven and
communication is facilitated by a mediator (Umbreit, 1991). Most important in VOM are the
informational and emotional needs that victims have that are central to the healing process
(Umbreit, 1998). This research focuses on four different needs: the need to restore the feelings of
agency, the need for information, emotional needs and the need to mentally cope with the crime.
The need to restore agency, is introduced by Shnabel and Nadler, (2015). Their research
builds upon the needs-based model of reconciliation, which is based on the assumption that
reconciliation between the victim and the offender cannot be achieved until different needs are
fulfilled (Shnabel and Nadler, 2008). Theories of reconciliation stress that merely focusing on
satisfying the instrumental needs of opponents, such as an economical need, does not resolve the
conflict (Rusbult & Van Lange, 1996). It also depends on satisfying the emotional needs. In their
model, Schnabel and Nadler (2008) propose that when a person is victimized it threatens their
feelings of agency: feelings of control, power and influence (Shnabel & Nadler, 2015). The need
of the victim would therefore be to restore their feelings of agency (Shnabel & Nadler, 2015). Once
this need is fulfilled, which can be done through a message of empowerment, there will be
increased willingness to reconcile (Shnabel & Nadler, 2008; Shnabel & Nadler, 2015).
We propose that an alternative way to restore this feeling of agency is through mediation.
When mediation takes place, the offender can acknowledge his responsibility, which leads to some
sort of debt that only the victim can take away, by granting forgiveness (Shnabel and Nadler,
2008). The fact that only the victim can grand forgiveness, probably gives some sense of control
and power. Getting an apology then also heightens the feelings of agency (Shnabel & Nadler,
2015). This need to restore agency appears in more studies but it is called ‘having an impact’.
What this impact contains is very divergent: it could help the offender (Coates & Gehm, 1999;
Wemmers & Cyr, 2004; Umbreit, Coates & Vos, 2004); it could make the offender aware of his
or her responsibilities (Coates & Gehm, 1999; Wemmers & Cyr, 2004; Umbreit et. al., 2004);
share pain with the offender (Umbreit et. al., 2004); and/or letting the offender know what the
3
impact was (Boom et. al., 2008; Wyrick & Constanzo, 1999). If someone participates in VOM to
have an impact on the offender, this seems to be some sort of need to restore the feelings of agency:
I choose to participate in VOM, because in this way I can have influence on the offender.
The need for information is derived from the study of Boom et al., (2008). Victims have a
need to know more about the offense, offender and his motives (Boom et. al., 2008). Reeves (1999)
also concluded that victims participate in VOM because they are curious and because they want to
know why offenders committed the act.
The third need is the emotional need. Boom et. al., (2008) describe the emotional need in
relation to the offender as recovery/restoration, repair of relationships and mentally coping with
the crime. Victims have the need to repair the relationship with others and to deal with the crime,
which can be done by mediation. This need is somewhat more related to the victim itself and its
own recovery. Most of the emotional needs deal with processing the crime, restoration/recovery
and closure (Boom et. al., 2008).
Although emotional needs are different described as the other needs mentioned, within the
research of Schnabel and Nadler (2008) the need to restore the feelings of agency is also defined
as an emotional need. This implies that there is a need working as an umbrella. Victims have the
need to mentally cope with the crime and to get closure. To accomplish this they might need to
restore their feelings of agency. The same might apply to the need for information. Victims could
have the need for information, to put everything into place and cope with it. The emotional need
per se, is more direct related to mediation, such as meeting the offender. The three needs mentioned
might all fall under the need to mentally cope with the crime. This leads to the following
hypothesis:
H1: The need to restore the feelings of agency, the need for information and the emotional
needs, all fall under the same construct: the need to mentally cope with the crime.
There are also reasons why people are not willing to participate in VOM. Most victims
who refuse to participate do this because they are afraid of the offender (Gehm, 1999) or they do
not believe the sincerity of the offender (Niemeyer & Schichor, 1996; Wemmers & Cyr, 2004).
Not willing to meet the offender also depends on the level of fear according to Gehm (1999).
To get an idea of how these needs might determine whether victims are willing to
participate in VOM and how these needs determine the preference of the communication form for
VOM, existing and new forms of mediation will now first be discussed. This is based on the media
richness approach.
The richness approach to communication
Until now most forms of mediation in practice are either face-to-face mediation or mediation
through letter exchange. SiB also applies shuttle mediation. Because technology these days is a
very important tool and people communicate a lot through online media, it is interesting to examine
whether people prefer online over offline communication and in which particular form. Besides
4
that it is very interesting if there is a communication form which has the positive effects of face-
to-face mediation, but is less confronting.
In the literature different forms of communication can be divided and classified based on
the media richness theory. The term media richness can be defined as follows: “media richness
refers to the information-carrying capacity of the medium” (Dainton & Zelley, 2014 p.184). The
richness of a medium can be determined by assessing four characteristics: speed of feedback,
ability to personalize the message, availability of multiple cues and language variety (Daft &
Lengel, 1986). Face-to-face communication has the highest richness, because people can provide
immediate feedback, can alter their message to the person, and make use of non-verbal cues. A
letter on the other hand is low in richness, because one cannot provide immediate feedback and
there is a lack of nonverbal cues.
Swaab, Galinsky, Medvec and Diermeier (2012) use the term richness approach to refer to
a two-dimensional model based on the characteristics of different richness theories. The two
dimensions are synchronous versus asynchronous communication and face-to-face versus text-
based communication. Synchronous and asynchronous communication refers to the possibility of
providing direct feedback (Dainton & Zelley, 2014). The other dimension describes the presence
of visual and vocal cues (Swaab et. al., 2012). The following sections describe the different forms
of communication used in this research based on the richness approach, to determine which forms
are richer and which forms are poorer.
Introducing new forms of mediation
The forms of mediation that will be examined within this research are face-to-face mediation,
video calling, shuttle mediation, chatting and letter or email exchange. These forms are put into
order from most rich to least rich.
Face-to-face mediation is the richest form of mediation (Daft & Lengel, 1986; Dainton &
Zelley, 2014). In a conversation one can provide immediate feedback, so it is synchronous
communication and it contains both visual and vocal cues, such as eye contact, intonations and
bodily communication. Video calling is comparable to face-to-face communication. Both are
synchronous forms of mediation. The bodily cues send through video calling can be the same if
the camera is well adjusted and shows the whole body. One big difference between these two is
that during video calling one cannot make eye contact. This is due to a wrong eye gaze angle (Tam,
Cafazzo, Seto, Salenieks & Rossos, 2007). The camera is most often placed above the display,
whereby the observer perceives the other as looking down rather than in the eye (Chen, 2002; Tam
et. al., 2007). This difference between the two communication channels can cause a big difference
in the effect of the mediation, because eye contact is a very important factor for natural
communication (Chen, 2002)2.
Shuttle mediation needs a different approach. Even though it is richer in cues, it is
questionable whether it has better effects on the feelings of anger and fear than for example letter
2 Although there are ways to prevent the eye gaze angle, for this research it is the question if eye-contact is an
important factor. That is way in this research the eye gaze angle must be present.
5
exchange or e-mail exchange. Within shuttle mediation the mediator shuttles between the victim
and the offender and provides the messages sent from the other party. For example, the offender
tells his or her apology to the mediator and then the mediator tells the apology to the victim. This
form is richer in cues than letter exchange or chatting, because it has vocal and visual cues.
However the mediator may give wrong intonations, which may cause negative effects on anger
and fear. So the effects might be less (or reversed even) in comparison to letter exchange, e-mail
exchange and chatting even though it is a richer form of mediation.
After shuttle mediation the richest form of communication is chatting. Chatting means the
exchange of messages online in real time with one or more people using a computer network
(Oxford dictionary). This is also a synchronous form of communication, because one can give
immediate feedback. The face-to-face cues on the other hand are missing, so it is text-based
communication.
Letter and e-mail exchange are even less rich. Both are asynchronic forms of
communication and fully text-based, without further social cues. Letter exchange is however a bit
more asynchronic because it takes longer to send. It can take two days before a letter is received.
An e-mail needs seconds. Thereby is it expected that the youth prefer emailing above writing
letters, because emailing probably fits better to the experience of the youth. Nowadays youth even
do not write emails anymore but prefer instant text messaging such as Whatsapp (De Gelderlander,
2014; Mortelmans & De Reyt, 2003).
We can now turn to the relationship between the needs victims have and the preference of
the communication channel. As said before victims have the need to restore their feelings of
agency. This has to do with having an impact on the offender. If a communication channel has
both verbal and non-verbal cues, it is expected to have a greater impact. That is why it is expected
that people with a higher need to restore their feelings of agency prefer a more rich form of
communication. The same is expected for the need for information. People with a higher need for
information, prefer a richer form of mediation because the non-verbal cues give more information
than only text-based communication. The richness of the preferred form of communication is also
expected to be higher, if the emotional needs are higher. Through nonverbal cues people give a lot
away about their emotions (Cunningham, 1977). Facial expressions sometimes say even more than
vocal sounds (Cunningham, 1977). A richer form of communication has more of these nonverbal
cues. If people have higher emotional needs, they probably prefer a richer form, because this
provides more emotional input. Based on this the following hypothesis can be made:
H2: The higher the need to restore the feelings of agency, the need for information, the
emotional needs and the need to mentally cope with the richer the preferred form of
communication.
On the other hand the literature indicates that people are not willing to participate because they are
afraid of the offender or they are questioning the sincerity of the offender (Gehm, 1996; Niemeyer
& Schichor, 1996; Wemmers &Cyr, 2004). Even though victims do have different needs and these
6
needs can be fulfilled through mediation, their fear towards the offender can be of such an extent
that people either do not want to participate or they choose a medium that is lower in richness.
This lead to the following hypothesis:
H3: The relation between the higher levels of needs and the richness of the preferred form
of communication is negatively influenced by feelings of fear towards the offender and a
higher estimation of the insincerity of the offender.
The importance of an apology
The second aim of this research is measuring the effects of the different forms of media. This will
be done by providing apologies, because an apology is a key aspect of the mediation process (Choi,
Bazemore & Gilbert, 2012). Choi and Severson (2009) conducted a research to examine the effects
of apologies given by the offender. They concluded that although victims accepted the apology
given by the offender, they did not think it was sincere (Choi and Severson, 2009). One explanation
for this is the non-verbal cues one gets during an apology, which determines the sincerity (Lee,
2005). In some cases Choi and Severson (2009) observed that non-verbal behaviors were absent.
The effect of non-verbal cues also seems apparent in the study of Zebel (2012). He conducted a
study in which he examined the differences in effect between face-to-face mediation and letter
exchange. It was concluded that face-to-face mediation has positive effects as it reduced both fear
and anger among victims, while mediation through letter exchange only had a positive effect3 on
fear. The richness of a letter is lower than the richness of face-to-face contact, mostly due to the
missing of non-verbal cues during letter exchange. Based on the findings of Choi and Severson
(2009), the better effects of mediation are due to the richness the used medium has. This gives the
following hypothesis:
H4: The more rich the apology is perceived4, the less fear and anger people have after
receiving the (same) apology. 5
Also the sincerity of an apology is very important for fulfilling the needs of victims (Choi et. al.,
2012). Choi and Severson (2009) concluded that the perceived sincerity depends on the nonverbal
cues of the apology. A richer form of mediation contains more (nonverbal) cues. That is why the
apologies given by these forms of mediation, are probably perceived as more sincere. This gives
the following hypothesis:
3 A positive effect means, that after receiving mediation the amount of fear and anger one has, declines or
disappears.
4 Participants will determine how rich they thought an apology was. Their estimation of the richness will be used to
analyze the hypothesis and not the order of richness given according to the media richness theory. This order might
differ from the experience the participants may have.
5 The apologie used in this research is given through different communication forms. The content of the apology is
the same in every communication form.
7
H5: The richer the medium is perceived, the more the (same) apology is perceived as
sincere.
It is expected that the effect of the perceived richness on the decline of the feelings of fear and
anger will be explained, by the apology being perceived as more sincere. This leads to the
following hypothesis:
H6: The relation between the perceived richness of the form of mediation and the lessening
of the feelings of fear and anger, is explained by the perceived sincerity of the (same)
apology.
Until now it is expected that a richer form of communication has stronger effects on the feelings
of anger and fear. Swaab et. al., (2008) conducted a study to examine whether a rich medium
always is the best communication channel. If persons have a noncooperative orientation during a
negotiation with a rich communication form the results are negative, because people may interpret
others actions wrong and are more self-centered (Swaab et. al., 2008). If persons have neutral
orientation, which means they are not sure if to be cooperative or noncooperative, the results are
positive when there is a rich communication form present. The reason for this is that the verbal
and non-verbal cues make people see the opponent as cooperative, because they getting to know
the opponent (Swaab et. al., 2008). Hence that these cues must have a positive impact, to get a
cooperative orientation (Swaab et. al., 2008). Victims probably have a neutral orientation. On the
one hand they might be cooperative because they want to help offender (Umbreit et. al., 2004), but
on the other hand they fear the offender (Cyr, 2004). A richer form of communication during
mediation then will probably have better effect. This seems to be the case, because face-to-face
mediation has better effects than letter exchange (Zebel, 2012). Within this research participants
will be provided with an apology given through the communication channel they choose. If
participants however decide to not take part in the mediation process, they still get an apology6.
These participants probably have a noncooperative orientation. When they are provided with a rich
form of communication the effects on the feelings of anger and fear will probably be negative.
This leads to the following hypothesis:
H7: The negative relation between the richness of the form of mediation and the feelings
of fear and anger is negatively influenced by an involuntary choice.
The hypotheses are summarized in the research model, which can be seen in figure 1.
6 People who are unwilling to particate are random assigned to one of the six communication forms. See the research
design for more information.
8
Current research
This research will examine how the need to restore the feelings of agency, the need for information,
the emotional need and the need to mentally cope with the crime determine the preference of
communication channel in VOM for victims. Participants read a scenario imaging being the victim.
Subsequently choosing if they are willing to participate in VOM and which form of
communication they prefer: face-to-face mediation, video calling, shuttle mediation, chatting,
email exchange or letter exchange. Participants receive an apology from the offender through their
preferred communication channel. This means that there is no synchronous communication.
Someone not willing to participate will be randomly assigned to one of the six communication
channel. This will answer the question of what the effects of the apology are.
Figure 1: research model (IV=independent variable DV=dependent variable)
Method
Research design
Figure 1 provides an overview of the independent and dependent variables used in this study and
the relationships between those variables. This study is quasi-experimental, because participants
cannot be random assigned to one of the communication channels: it was a voluntary choice. They
had to choose one out of seven mediation options: no mediation, face-to-face mediation, video
calling, shuttle mediation, chatting, email exchange or letter exchange.
Two variables, the richness of the apology and the perceived sincerity of the apology,
functioned as both dependent and independent variable. The perceived richness of the apology was
dependent because it was expected that if the richness of the preferred communication channel
based on the media richness approach was higher, the perceived richness was also higher. It was
independent because it explained the feelings of anger and fear and the perceived sincerity. The
perceived sincerity was both a dependent and independent variable, because it is expected to be a
mediator.
9
Participants
Through snowball and convenience sampling, in total 429 people started with the questionnaire
but 246 people completed the study. 245 of these completed studies could be used in the analysis7.
The response rate was 57.3 percent. 75.1 percent of these participants were female (n=184) and
24.9 percent was male (n=61). The average age was 25.6 years and varied between 18 and 62 years
of age. The majority of the participants were Dutch, 78.4 percent (n=192). The other participants
were German (n=53). There were only a few participants who have been victimized, 14.7% (n=36)
and some more who knew someone who have been victimized, 37.1% (n=91). There were even
less participants who said that they committed a crime once in their life, 2.4% (n=6) or knew
someone who committed a crime, 15.9% (n=39).
Although the goal of 250 participants was almost completed, there was no perfect
distribution of the participants over the different communication channels. Some communication
channels were chosen by only a few participants (n=10). Because of this it was decided to merge
the letter exchange and email exchange channels. As explained before, these channels are almost
the same, except that a letter takes longer to arrive. This was however not present in this study,
because there was no real interaction. For the involuntary choice it was not a problem if some
channels only contained a few participants, because all channels were merged together as one
variable: involuntary participation. In Table 1 an overview is given of the distribution of
participations across the different channels.
Table 1
Distribution of the participants per communication channel (n=245)
Materials
All participants read the same story about a person who was victim of a violent robbery while
getting money out of an ATM machine. The person gets hit into the face. It was written in the
‘you’ writing form. Participants had to imagine they were the victim in the story. Kippers (2015)
and Van der Herberg (2013) also conducted a study in which people had to imagine they were
7 One person scored the same on the feelings of fear and anger on the pretest and the posttest. This means that there
could not be an effect from the apology. This person was excluded from the analysis.
Communication channel Voluntary participated (n) Involuntary participated (n)
Before merging After merging Before merging After merging
Face-to-face 117 (47.8%) 117 (47.8%) 8 (3.3%) 8 (3.3%)
Video calling 14 (5.7%) 14 (5.7%) 6 (2.4%) 6 (2.4%)
Chatting 20 (8.2%) 20 (8.2%) 10 (4.1%) 10 (4.1%)
Email exchange 18 (7.3%) 28 (11.4%) 11 (4.5%) 16 (6.5%)
Letter exchange 10 (4.1%) 5 (2.0%)
Shuttle mediation 20 (8.2%) 20 (8.2%) 6 (2.4%) 6 (2.4%)
Total 199 (81.2%) 199 (81.2%) 46 (18.8%) 46 (18.8%)
10
victimized. Because the design used in the study is comparable to the study of Kippers (2015) the
same story will be used.
Participants also received an apology based on choice for mediation form or based on
random assignment8. The participants either read a written apology or saw a video. The apology
given through the different communication channels were standardized in terms of the content. In
that way the effects measured were due to the communication channel. The apology message was
based on the points for writing an apology given by Seymour, English and Weston (2001). The
offender first gives his appreciation for getting in contact with the victim and he tries to imagine
what is must be like for the victim and what the impact of the crime must have been. Subsequently
he admits it was a stupid mistake that should not have happened and he apologizes for it. Table 2
contains the different communication channel with a short description of the characteristics of the
apology to make the differences clear. A screenshot of every type of communication is given in
appendix A.
Table 2
Description of the characteristics of the apologies per communication channel
Communication channel Characteristics
Face-to-face Video recording of the offender reading his apology to the victim. It contains
nonverbal cues such as body language, looking the victim in the eye and vocal
cues such as tone of voice and intonations.
Video calling Video recording of the offender reading his apology to the victim. It also
contained nonverbal cues and vocal cues comparable to face-to-face
communication. The difference between these two is that video calling did not
contain eye contact due to the eye gaze angle.
Chatting Picture of a chat wherein the offender typed his apology to the victim. The victim
reads it of the screen. It is fully text-based.
Letter Picture of a letter written by the offender with his apology which the victim reads.
It is fully text-based.
E-mail Picture of an e-mail written by the offender with his apology which the victim
reads. It is fully text-based.
Shuttle mediation Video recording of the mediation reading the apology of the offender to the
victim. It contains nonverbal cues such as body language and vocal cues.
8 This study did not contain a real mediation process, because there was no interaction or synchronous
communication. This was not possible because it was an online study.
11
Research instrument
The research instrument consisted of 79 items. First the independent variables will be explained.
After that the dependent variables will be explained. All the items can be found in the example of
the questionnaire in appendix B.
Independent variables
The independent variables within this research were the needs of the victims, estimation of the
insincerity of the offender, the voluntariness of the participation in VOM, fear towards the offender
and the perceived sincerity.
The variables the need for information, the emotional need and the need to mentally cope
with the crime were all measured with three items (α=.85, α=.78 and α=.85). The need to restore
the feelings of agency was measured with four items (α=.82). The items were based on the
description of the needs by Boom et. al., (2008). An example of the need to restore the feelings of
agency was: “To what extent do you want to make the offender aware of the consequences of his
actions”. The variable emotional need was measured with for example the question: “To what
extent do you want to meet the offender”. The need for information was measured with for example
the question: ‘To what extent do you need information from the offender about the offense”. An
example of the variable need to mentally cope with the crime was: “To what extent do you need
closure for the event”.
The variable perceived sincerity of the apology was measured with three items. An
example of an item was: “I doubt if the apology was sincere”. The reliability of this variable was
α=.91.
An important independent variable was the voluntariness of the participation in VOM (yes
or no). This was based on the question if people wanted to participate in VOM and which
communication channel they preferred. If people choose no, they still got an apology. This was
the involuntary participation.
Fear towards the offender was measured with five items (α=.92). These items were adopted
from the study of Gröbe (2013). Every item was introduced with the sentence: “If I, as a victim
think back to the offender after two weeks I would be …”. The dots are filled with a specific
feeling. An example for the variable fear would be “nervous” or “insecure”. Fear in general was
measured in the same way, except for the question asked. The question asked to measure fear in
general was “If I, as a victim think back to the crime after two weeks I would be …”. A factor
analysis showed however that there is no distinction between the two different forms of fear,
because there was one factor with an eigenvalue higher than one. It explained 58.0 percent of the
variance. In the remaining of this article there will only be one variable fear. Fear on the pretest
was then measured with ten items (α=.92).
The last independent variable was the estimation of the insincerity of the offender was
measured with three items (α=.82). An example of an item was: “I have the feeling that what the
offender is going to say to me is sincere”. There was no other questionnaire to adopt these items
from. The items were based on rationale thinking.
12
Dependent variables
The dependent variables were the preference of the communication channel, the perceived richness
of the apology and feelings of anger and fear. The variable preference of the communication
channel was measured by asking participants if they were willing to participate in VOM and which
communication channel they prefer. Within this research we had an assumption about the richness
of the apologies. The face-to-face apology was considered to be most rich and the letter exchange
as least rich. To examine if lay people also experience the same classification we administered five
questions to participants about the richness of the apology they received (α=.79). One question
was for example “The amount of information I got was sufficient”.
The feelings of anger and fear were measured two times. Before the apology was given
and afterwards. In this way the effects of the apology could be determined. In the first part the
variables were independent. In the second part of the study the variables were dependent. These
items were measured in the same way as the variable fear as explained above. The reliability of
the variable fear was α=.93 on the posttest. The reliability of the variable anger was α=.86 on the
pretest and α=.91 on the posttest.
Control variables
The questionnaire started with some questions about demographics and ended with some control
questions about the extent to which people could relate to the victim in the scenario and in if there
were any distractions while filling in the questionnaire. The aim of these questions was to examine
if the effects found were due to the independent variables and not to other variables.
To see if the scenario had an influence on the participants comparable to real victims, the
loss of control was measured. A factor analysis however showed that only two of the three items
used to measure this variable, scored high on this factor9. The items ‘to which extent do you think
you have difficulty coping with challenges in life’ and ‘to what extent do you have trouble with
solving daily problems’ scored high on the factor with an eigenvalue higher than one and explained
59.5 percent of the variance. The item ‘to what extent do you have control over things that happen
to you in life’ scored low on this factor (.29).
Additional variables
Because there are some other variables that could be predicted by the richness of the apology these
were also measured. These are the variables perceived suffering of the offender, perceived
responsibility taking of the offender and behavioral expectations. All these variables were
measured with three items adopted from the research of Giner-Sorollea and Zebel (2016) (α=.69,
α=.72 and α=.74). An example of the variable suffering was: “I doubt whether the offender is
suffering emotionally from the effects of his actions”. An example question of the variable
responsibility taking was: I have the feeling that the offender takes responsibility for his actions”.
The last variable, behavioral expectations, was measured with for example the question “I think
that the offender is motivated to prevent repeating his actions”.
9 A factor analysis was applied to all variables. However for all the other variables, the items drafted for a specific
variable, all measured the same factor.
13
Procedure
The research is conducted through an online-platform, qualtrics.com. In this way a lot of
respondents could participate in a very short time and it gave the possibility to reach a lot of people.
Before the respondents participated they were informed that anonymity was guaranteed and that
they could withdraw every single moment during the research with no further explanation. It was
also noted that it would take 15 minutes to complete the questionnaire. After this the participants
read the scenario imaging being a victim and they had to fill in the items measuring fear, anger,
loss of control and the different needs. After this, mediation was explained and this was followed
by the items measuring the construct estimation of the insincerity of the offender. Subsequently
they had to choose one out of the seven options: no mediation, face-to-face mediation, video
calling, shuttle mediation, chatting, email exchange or letter exchange. If someone choose no, this
person was randomly assigned to one of the six communication forms. After people read or heard
the apology the variables perceived richness of the apology, perceived sincerity of the apology,
the additional variables and the feelings of anger and fear were measured. Note that during the
study it was constantly asked what someone would choose being the victim. The questionnaire
ended with some control questions about the extent to which people could imagine being the victim
and with questions considering the distractions during participating.
Results
Overall view
In Table 3 an overview is given of the main variables used in this research. It contains the number
of participants, mean score, standard deviation per variable and correlations between the variables.
First thing to notice is that participant scored higher on fear and anger at the pretest (n=5.37,
n=5.52) than on the posttest (n=4.01, n=4.12).
In general people scored high on the need for agency (M=5.55), need for information
(M=4.81) and the need to mentally cope with the crime (M=5.87) and more neutral on the on the
emotional need (M=4.13). The estimation of the insincerity and the perceived richness (M=4.27)
and sincerity of the apology (M=4.24) were also neutral 10 . What is notable is the positive
correlation between the perceived richness of the apology and the perceived sincerity of the
apology (.51). This in accordance with what was expected according to the research model: when
the apology is perceived as richer, it is also perceived as more sincere. The same applies to the
negative correlation between the perceived sincerity of the apology and the feelings of fear (-.25)
anger on the posttest (-.42). It is expected that when the apology is perceived is richer, the feelings
of fear and anger decline more. The correlations between the perceived sincerity of the apology
and the feeling of fear (.01) and anger (-.13) on the pretest are much weaker or not even significant.
This means that the feelings of fear and anger do not just correlate with the variable sincerity of
10 The items were measured with a 7-point likertscale. The value of 4 was considered to be neutral, because it was
also labeled in the questionnaire as neutral. The values higher than 4 were considered as high and values under 4
considered as low.
14
the apology, but there is probably an effect of the sincerity of the apology on these feelings,
because of the apology.
Table 3
Descriptives of and correlations between the main variables
N M SD 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11
1. Fear pretest 245 5.37 0.99 - .38** .19** .12 .16* .28** .19** .14* -.05 .05 .01
2. Fear posttest 239 4.01 1.08 - .15* .57** .08 .07 -.05 -.04 .11 -.17** -.25**
3. Anger pretest 245 5.52 1.00 - .40** .18** .13* .10 .05 -.02 -.10 -.13*
4. Anger posttest 243 4.12 1.21 - .03 .00 -.09 -.05 .23** -.27** -.42**
5. Need for agency 243 5.55 1.14 - .24** .39** .16* -.18** -.02 -.00
6. Need for information 242 4.81 1.47 - .39** .15* -.22** .02 .05
7. Emotional need 241 4.13 1.43 - .27** -.49** .01 .16*
8. Need to mentally cope 244 5.87 1.02 - -.17** .09 .02
9. Estimation of the insincerity
of the offender
245 4.27 1.25 - -.18** -.42**
10. Richness of the apology 245 4.24 1.08 - .51**
11. Perceived sincerity of the
apology
244 3.55 1.37 -
Note. *p<0.05; **p<0.01. All variables were measured on a scale of 1 to 7
Testing the hypotheses
The first hypothesis proposed that the need to restore the feelings agency, the need for information
and the emotional needs, all fall under the same construct, the need to mentally cope with the
crime. A factor analysis showed however that there were four different constructs and there was
no overarching construct. These four constructs together explained 72.44 percent of the variance.
The first factor was named the need to restore the feelings of agency, explaining 20.3 percent of
the variance. The second factor was named the need to mentally cope with the crime and explained
18.0 percent of the variance. The third factor was named the need for information and explained
also 18.0 percent of the variance. The last factor was named the emotional need and explained 16.1
percent of the variance. The items used to measure the different construct all measured high (>.64)
on the corresponding factor. A full description of the different constructs can be found in part 2.5,
research instrument. Hypothesis one is therefore rejected, because there was no overarching
construct found in a factor analysis.
The relation between the needs of victims and preference of communication channel
The second and third hypothesis both contain predictions about the needs people have and how
these needs determine whether people are willing to participate in mediation and which form of
communication they prefer. To test hypothesis two - the higher the need to restore the feelings of
agency, the need for information, the emotional needs and the need to mentally cope with the
crime, the richer the preferred form of communication – a multinomial regression analysis was
used. The independent variables were the different needs. The dependent variable was the richness
of the communication form. The richness of the communication channels were subdivided in the
following way. Face-to-face mediation, video calling and shuttle mediation are all communication
15
forms in which there is both nonverbal and verbal communication. Chatting, letter exchange and
email exchange however contain only text-based information. To analyze hypothesis two (and
three) the following distribution of richness is used – no mediation (n=46), verbal-nonverbal
communication (which is considered as most rich) (n=151) and text-based communication (which
is considered as less rich) (n=48)11. There was no significant prediction of the need for agency
(X2=.06 p=.97), but a significant prediction of the need for information (X2=7.87 p=.02) and the
emotional need (X2=20.54 p<.005). There was also a marginal significant effect for the need to
mentally cope with the crime (X2=5.25 p=.07).
The three different groups of communication were also specifically compared to each
other. When the verbal-nonverbal communication forms are compared to the no mediation group
both a higher need for information and a higher emotional need positively predicted the choice for
a richer form of communication compared to the no choice (Exp(B)=1.40 SE=.17 p=.01;
Exp(B)=1.93 SE=.17 p<.005). The need for information also positively predicted the choice for a
text based-form of communication compared to no mediation (Exp(B)=1.44 SE=.16 p=.02). This
means that the higher the informational needs, the richer the preferred communication channel.
People with higher emotional needs prefer verbal-nonverbal forms of communication over no-
mediation and text-based forms of communication. This was also visible when the verbal-
nonverbal forms of communication are compared to the text-based forms of communication. The
emotional need and the need to mentally cope with the crime positively predicted the choice for
verbal-nonverbal form of communication compared to text-based communication (Exp(B)=1.53
SE=.15 p=.005; Exp(B)=1.49 SE=.18 p=.03). This again means that people who have higher
emotional needs prefer a nonverbal-verbal form of communication. The same goes for people with
a higher need to mentally cope with the crime, as expected. As can be seen in Tables 4 and 5 the
other needs did not have any significant prediction, which is not in accordance with the hypothesis.
This means that hypothesis two is partly confirmed.
Table 4
Regression coefficients for the different needs as predictors for the preference of the richness of the communication
channel (n=237) (reference category is: no mediation preferred).
Richness Effect B SE Exp(B) p
Verbal and non-verbal (rich) Need for agency .04 .17 1.04 .82
Informational need .34 .13 1.40 .01
Emotional need .66 .17 1.93 <.005
Need to mentally cope .25 .19 1.28 .20
Textual based (less rich) Need for agency .01 .19 1.01 .94
Informational need .37 .16 1.44 .02
Emotional need .23 .19 1.26 .21
Need to mentally cope -.16 .20 .86 .43
11 This distribution was also apparent according the participants based on the means of the perceived richness.
16
Table 5
Regression coefficients for the different needs as predictors for the preference of the richness of the communication
channel (n=237)(reference group is: text based communication preferred).
Richness Effect B SE Exp(B) p
Verbal and non-verbal (rich) Need for agency .03 .17 1.03 .88
Informational need -.03 .14 .98 .85
Emotional need .43 .15 1.53 .005
Need to mentally cope .40 .18 1.49 .03
The third hypothesis - the relation between the higher levels of needs and the richness of
the preferred form of communication is negatively influenced by feelings of fear towards the
offender and the estimation of the insincerity of the offender – was also tested through a
multinomial regression analysis. The richness of the communication form was again the dependent
variable. The independent variables were the needs, the feelings of fear and the estimation of the
insincerity of the offender. The two-way interactions between the needs and feelings of fear and
estimation of the insincerity of the offender were added and examined. The analysis showed a
significant main effect for the need for information (X2=10.38 p=.006) and for the need for agency
(X2=7.15 p=.028). There is a significant interaction effect between the need for information and
the feelings of fear (X2=5.99 p=.05) and a marginal significant interaction effect for the need for
emotion and the estimation of the insincerity (X2=5.73 p=.057). There were no other significant
effects in this model (Table 6).
Table 6
Regression coefficients of the main effects of the needs, feelings of fear and estimation of the insincerity of the offender
and the interaction effects between the needs and the feelings of fear and the estimation of the insincerity of the
offender (n=237)
Effect X2 df p
Need for agency 7.15 2 .03
Informational need 10.38 2 .006
Emotional need .84 2 .66
Need to mentally cope .31 2 .86
Fear 4.31 2 .12
Estimation of the insincerity .06 2 .97
Agency*fear 3.05 2 .22
Information*fear 5.99 2 .05
Emotion*fear .02 2 .99
Mentally cope*fear .96 2 .62
Agency*insincerity 3.77 2 .15
Information*insincerity 1.69 2 .43
Emotion*insincerity 5.73 2 .06
Mentally cope*insincerity .32 2 .85
17
Again the preferred ways of communication were compared. If the choice for a verbal-
nonverbal form of communication is compared to the choice for no mediation there is a positive
prediction of the need for agency (Exp(B)=17.99 SE=1.21 p=.02) and the need for information
(Exp(B)=13.3 SE=.85 p=.002), meaning that people with higher needs prefer a verbal-nonverbal
communication form over no mediation, as expected. There is also a marginal significant positive
prediction for the feelings of fear (Exp(B)=34.19 SE=1.87 p=.059). If people have higher feelings
of fear, they prefer a verbal-nonverbal form of communication over no mediation, which is not as
expected. The need for information and the feelings of fear interact with each other (Exp(B)=.74
SE=.14 p=.03). This means that when people have high informational need it does not matter if
they have high or low feelings of fear, they prefer verbal-nonverbal communication over no
mediation. When people have lower informational need they are less willing to participate and this
is amplified when people have low feelings of fear (figure 2). This effect of fear was not as
expected.
Figure 2: interaction plot information*fear for participation in richer forms of communication (reference category: no
mediation preferred)
When the choice for no mediation is compared to text-based communication forms, there is only
a marginal significant prediction from the need for information (Exp(B)=6.11 SE=.96 p=.058).
Meaning that people with higher need for information prefer both a verbal-nonverbal and textual
based form of communication over no mediation. This was also expected.
The last comparison made is between the choice for verbal-nonverbal forms of
communication and text-based forms. There is marginal significant prediction for the need for
agency (Exp(B)=9.39 SE=1.17 p=.055). If people have a higher need for agency they prefer a
verbal-nonverbal form of communication. The need for emotion and the estimation of the
insincerity interact (Exp(B)=1.37 SE=.14 p=.02). If people have a high emotional need or a low
estimation of the insincerity of the offender they prefer a verbal-nonverbal form of communication
over text based communication. If people have lower emotional needs and a higher estimation of
the insincerity of the offender there preference for verbal-nonverbal forms of communication
decline, as expected (figure 3). There is no straightforward conclusion for hypothesis three. The
18
results are still very inconclusive. A full reflection on the conclusion of hypothesis three is given
in the discussion part. All the B, Exp(B), SE and p-values can be found in Table 7 and 812.
Figure 3: interaction plot emotion*insincerity willingness to participate in verbal-nonverbal communication forms
(reference category: text-based communication preferred)
Table 7
Regression coefficients for the different needs, the feelings of fear and the estimation of the insincerity as predictors
for the preference of the richness of the communication channel (n=237) (reference category is: no mediation
preferred).
Richness Effect B SE Exp(B) p
Verbal and non-verbal (rich) Need for agency 2.89 1.21 17.99 .02
Informational need 2.56 .85 13.3 .002
Emotional need -.45 1.19 .64 .70
Need to mentally cope .20 .170 1.23 .91
Fear 3.53 1.87 34.19 .06
Estimation of the insincerity -.15 1.30 .86 .91
Agency*fear -.34 .20 .71 .09
Information*fear -.31 .14 .74 .03
Emotion*fear -.02 .18 .98 .92
Mentally cope*fear -.06 .25 .94 .80
Agency*insincerity -.23 .15 .80 .14
Information*insincerity -.14 .12 .87 .27
Emotion*insincerity .24 .16 1.27 .13
Mentally cope*insincerity .10 .19 1.11 .59
Textual based (less rich) Need for agency .65 1.24 1.92 .60
Informational need 1.81 .96 6.11 .06
Emotional need .58 1.28 1.79 .65
Need to mentally cope .57 1.68 2.38 .61
Fear 3.14 1.98 23.21 .11
Estimation of the insincerity -.32 1.29 .73 .81
12 The multiple regression analysis was also conducted with all the different communication channels as dependent
variables. However there could be no solid conclusion drawn from this analysis (see appendix C).
19
Agency*fear -.15 .21 .86 .48
Information*fear -.27 .15 .76 .07
Emotion*fear .00 .20 1.00 1.00
Mentally cope*fear -.23 .25 .79 .36
Agency*insincerity .05 .15 1.05 .76
Information*insincerity -.00 .13 1.00 1.00
Emotion*insincerity -.08 .16 .92 .62
Mentally cope*insincerity .07 .17 1.07 .69
Table 8
Multiple regression analysis: Regression coefficients for the different needs, the feelings of fear and the estimation of
the insincerity as predictors for the preference of the richness of the communication channel (n=237) (reference
category is: text based communication preferred).
Richness Effect B SE Exp(B) p
Verbal and non-verbal (rich) Need for agency 2.24 1.17 9.39 .06
Informational need .87 .89 2.18 .38
Emotional need -1.03 1.12 .36 .36
Need to mentally cope -.66 1.58 .52 .68
Fear .39 1.75 1.47 .83
Estimation of the insincerity .17 1.20 1.18 .89
Agency*fear -.19 .19 .83 .32
Information*fear -.04 .14 .97 .87
Emotion*fear -.02 .17 .98 .91
Mentally cope*fear .17 .23 1.19 .47
Agency*insincerity -.27 .15 .76 .07
Information*insincerity -.14 .12 .87 .27
Emotion*insincerity .32 .14 1.37 .02
Mentally cope*insincerity .04 .17 1.04 .83
The effects of the apology
The following hypothesis examined the effects of the apology. The fourth hypothesis - the more
rich the apology is perceived, the less fear and anger people have after receiving the (same)
apology – was tested with a regression analysis. The dependent variables were fear and anger, the
independent variable was the perceived richness of the apology and we controlled for fear and
anger on the pretest and the voluntariness of the participation. Participants either participated
voluntary in the mediation process by choosing one of the six communication channels or they
participated involuntary by saying no to the mediation process and receiving an apology by random
assignment. This analysis shows a significant effect for the perceived richness on both the feelings
of fear (B=-.19 SE=.06 p=.001) and anger (B=-.26 SE=.06 p<.005) (Table 9). If the score on the
perceived richness is higher, the feelings of anger and fear are lower. This means that hypothesis
four is confirmed.
20
Table 9
Regression coefficients of feelings on the pretest, voluntariness and perceived richness of the apology predicting the
feelings on the posttest
Feeling Predictor B SE Exp(B) p
Fear Fear pretest .46 .06 .409 <.005
Voluntariness (0=no 1=yes) -.51 .16 -.17 .002
Perceived richness of the apology -.19 .06 -.19 .001
Anger Anger pretest .45 .18 .37 .01
Voluntariness (0=no 1=yes) -.46 .07 -.15 <.005
Perceived richness of the apology -.26 .06 -.23 <.005
The fifth hypothesis - the richer the medium is perceived, the more the (same) apology is
perceived as sincere – was also tested with a regression analysis. The dependent variable was the
perceived sincerity and the independent variable was the perceived richness. Again we controlled
for the voluntariness of participation. The analysis showed that the perceived richness had indeed
a positive effect on the perceived sincerity (B=.65 SE=.07 p<.005) (Table 10). This means that if
people perceived the apology as more rich, they also perceived it as more sincere. This confirms
hypothesis five.
Table 10
Regression coefficients of voluntariness and perceived richness of the apology predicting the perceived sincerity of
the apology
Predictor B SE Exp(B) p
Voluntariness (0=no 1=yes) .51 .19 .14 .009
Perceived richness of the apology .65 .07 .51 <.005
The sixth hypothesis - the relation between the perceived richness of the form of mediation
and the lessening of the feelings of fear and anger, is explained by the perceived sincerity of the
(same) apology – was analyzed through mediation (regression) analysis. The dependent variables
were the feelings of fear and anger and the independent variables were the perceived richness and
the perceived sincerity. If there was indeed mediation, the effect of the perceived richness would
disappear when the perceived sincerity would be added as predictor in the model. We again
controlled for the feelings of fear and anger on the pretest and the voluntariness of the participation.
For fear the effect of the perceived sincerity was significant (B=-.15 SE=.056 p=.007), and the
effect of richness was no longer significant (B=-.10 SE=.07 p=.14). The same goes for the feelings
of anger. The effect of perceived sincerity proved significant (B=-.29 SE=.06 p<.005) and the
effect of the perceived richness was no longer significant (B=-.08 SE=.07 p=.26). This suggests a
full mediation (all coefficients can be found in Table 11). Sobel tests confirms this for both fear
(Z=-2.85 SE=.03 p=.004) and anger (Z=-4.31 SE=.04 p<.005). This means that the relation
between the perceived richness of the apology and the lower feelings of fear and anger is explained
21
by the perceived sincerity of the apology. This relation is displayed in figures 4 and 5. This
confirms the sixth hypothesis.
Table 11
Regression coefficients of the feelings on the pretest, voluntariness, perceived richness and the perceived sincerity of
the apology predicting the feelings on the posttest
Feeling predictor B SE EXP(b) p
Fear Fear pretest .44 .06 -.10 <.005
Voluntariness -.41 .16 -.16 .006
Perceived richness of the apology -.10 .07 -.10 .14
Perceived sincerity of the apology -.15 .05 -.18 .007
Anger Anger pretest .42 .07 .35 <.005
Voluntariness -.32 .17 -.11 .06
Perceived richness of the apology -.08 .07 -.07 .26
Perceived sincerity of the apology -.29 .06 -.32 <.005
Figure 4: mediation of the perceived sincerity on the relation between the perceived richness and the feelings of fear
(*p<.005) (B-value between brackets is the original relation between perceived richness and the feelings of fear)
Figure 5: mediation of the perceived sincerity on the relation between the perceived richness and the feelings of anger
(*p<.005) (B-value between brackets is the original relation between perceived richness and the feelings of anger)
22
The last hypothesis - the relation between the richness of the form of mediation and the
lessening of the feelings of fear and anger is negative influenced by an involuntary choice – was
analyzed with a moderator analysis. The dependent variables were the feelings of fear and anger.
As dependent variables, the variables perceived richness of the apology, the variable voluntariness
was used and the interaction variable perceived richness x voluntariness. We controlled for the
feelings of fear and anger on the pretest. This analysis showed that there was no interaction effect,
so no moderation of involuntariness on the feelings of fear (B=-.11 SE=.15 p=.47), or the feelings
of anger (B=-.01 SE=.17 p=.96). It was expected that when people involuntary participated, this
would have a negative effect on the feelings of fear and anger. This means that hypothesis seven
is not confirmed.
Other notable results
A regression analysis showed that women are more willing to participate than men in mediation
(B=.14 SE=.06 p=.02). What is also notable is that women experience more loss of control after
reading the scenario (B=.52 SE=.20 p=.01). Women experiencing more loss of control could be
the reason why they are more willing to participate in mediation. A mediation regression analysis
however showed that loss of control did not mediate the relation between gender and willingness
to participate in VOM (Loss of control: B=-.01 SE=.13 p=.93; Gender; B=.89 SE=.36 p=.01).
Another result to notice is that age has a significant effect on the willingness to participate.
Younger people are more willing to participate than older people (B(exp)=.97 SE=.01 p=.04). And
younger people prefer chatting and shuttle mediation were older people prefer no-mediation (Table
12). But these results were only marginal significant.
Table 12
Regression coefficients for age for the preference of the communication channel (n=245) (reference category is: no
choice).
Communication channel B SE Exp(B) p
Face-to-face -.02 .01 .98 .15
Video calling -.03 .03 .67 .30
Chatting -.12 .06 .89 .06
Letter or email e-mail exchange -.02 .02 .98 .44
Shuttle mediation -.10 .05 .91 .06
One last very important result to note is that even though hypothesis 7 is not confirmed and
the voluntariness of the participant did not have an effect on the relation between richness and the
feelings of fear and anger, there is an interesting difference in decline in the feelings of anger and
fear between people who voluntary participated and people who involuntary participated. As can
been seen in Table 13, people who voluntary participated had higher feelings of fear on the pretest
in comparison to people who involuntary participated, but lower feelings of fear on the posttest.
Both groups had the same score on the feelings of anger on the pretest, but the participants who
voluntary participated had lower feelings of anger on the posttest than people who involuntary
23
participated. What is also interesting is that people who involuntary participated scored lower on
the perceived sincerity (t(242)=-2.04 p=.04) but not on the perceived richness (t(243)=.38 p=.71)
in comparison to people who voluntary participated. The voluntariness of the participation in VOM
does not moderate the relation between the perceived richness and the perceived sincerity,
according to a regression analysis (B=.10 SE.18 p=.59). The explanation for the higher feelings of
fear and anger after mediation for people who involuntary participated in comparison to people
who voluntary participated, is therefore probably explained by the first group perceiving the
apology as less sincere (B=.45 SE=.22 p=.04).
Table 13
Means of the feelings of fear and anger for the voluntary and involuntary groups and the t-value and p-value of the
T-test
Feeling Moment of
measurement
Voluntary
participated
Involuntary
participated
t p (2-tailed)
Fear Pretest 5.43 5.11 -1.98 .05
Posttest 3.93 4.30 2.06 .04
Decline 1.48 0.81 -3.59 <.05
Anger Pretest 5.52 5.54 .36 .92
Posttest 4.03 4.48 .97 .03
Decline 1.49 1.06 -2.17 .03
Summary of the results
From the analyses it could be stated that hypothesis one is not confirmed. The need to mentally
cope with the crime was not an overarching variable for the need to restore the feelings of agency,
the need for information and the emotional need. The second hypothesis is partly confirmed. If
people have higher need for information they prefer both richer forms of communication and
textual based communication over no mediation. If people have higher emotional needs and a
higher need to mentally cope with the crime they prefer a richer form of communication. The third
hypothesis is harder to conclude, because the results contradict somewhat. A broad conclusion is
given in the discussion part of this research.
The conclusions of the hypothesis concerning the effects of the apology are clearer. If
people perceive the apology as more rich, their feelings of fear and anger are lower afterwards.
This confirmed hypothesis four. Hypothesis five was also confirmed. If the apology was perceived
as more rich, it was also perceived as more sincere. The perceived sincerity in turn mediated the
relation between the perceived sincerity and the decline in feelings of anger and fear which is in
agreement with hypothesis six. Hypothesis seven however not confirmed. If people were
involuntary exposed to the apology it did not have a negative effect on the feelings of anger and
fear. However people who involuntary participated showed a smaller decline in the feelings of
anger and fear and this was explained by the fact that they perceived the apology as less sincere.
24
Discussion
VOM has positive effects for both victims and offenders that participate (Umbreit et. al., 2000).
There are however still a lot of persons that do not want to participate (Zebel, 2012). This study
examined the application of new forms of communication in context of VOM, to see if victims
prefer other types of communication. This research examined how the need to restore the feelings
of agency, the informational need, the emotional need and the need to mentally cope with the crime
determine if people are willing to participate in VOM and what the preference is of victims. It was
looked if people preferred a rich form of communication which contains both verbal and nonverbal
cues or if they preferred a text-based form of communication. It was expected that victims with
higher needs prefer a rich form of communication which contains both verbal and non-verbal cues.
The informational need turned out to be an important predictor for the choice for richness of the
communication channel in VOM. A richer form of communication is important when people have
high informational needs. This is also true for victims with high emotional needs. However the
feelings of fear and the estimation of the insincerity of the offender also play a role in the
preference of the communication channel and this role is stronger than most needs (except for the
need for information). It seems that victims with higher feelings of fear prefer a richer form of
communication, which was against expectations.
The second main topic of this research was the effect of an apology given through the
different media channels. An apology perceived as richer, causes a greater decline in the feelings
of fear and anger, because people experience a richer apology as more sincere. If however people
involuntary participated in VOM it seemed that the effects of mediation decline, probably because
victims who involuntary participated experienced the apology as less sincere.
Discussion of the results
The overarching concept ‘need to mentally cope with the crime’
The need to mentally cope with the crime was not an overarching need factor for the other needs.
The need to restore the feelings of agency, the need for information, the emotional need and the
need to mentally cope with the crime seemed to be different concepts. This could mean that the
term ‘emotional needs’ used within the research of Schnabel and Nadler (2015) has a broader
meaning, because emotional need and the need to restore the feelings of agency may constitute
two different constructs in the current research. It also could mean that Boom et. al., (2008)
described the term emotional need in a too broad way. Another explanation however could be that
the term emotional need was not operationalized in a proper way in this research, because the items
also somewhat indicated the need for victim offender mediation. For example the items ‘in what
extent do you want to meet the offender’ and ‘to what extent do you need an apology from the
offender’. The emotional need could thus also be described as the need for VOM.
The relation between the needs of victims and preference of communication channel
This research examined four needs in relation to the willingness to participate in VOM and the
richness victims prefer. It seems that people with a higher need for information are more likely to
participate in VOM and that the higher the informational need the richer the communication
25
channel preferred. This confirms the findings of Reeves (1999) who also said that victims
participate in VOM because they are curious and they want to know why offenders committed the
act. It also seems that people with higher emotional needs prefer a richer form of communication.
This is in accordance with foregoing literature (Cunningham, 1977). Through nonverbal cues
people give a lot away about their emotions (Cunningham, 1977), information you cannot get from
only text-based messages. People with higher emotional needs, might need these nonverbal cues
to cope with the crime. If people do not have high emotional needs, textual based communication
might be enough because it is possible that it is sufficient enough for them get textual information
without nonverbal cues to cope with the crime.
Also the need to mentally cope with the crime did predict participation in VOM through a
rich communication channel (compared to text-based communication channels). This partly
confirmed our expectations that victims with a higher need to mentally cope with the crime, prefer
a rich communication channel. It means that it is important for people who are willing to
participate, with high feelings to mentally cope with the crime, to use a rich form of
communication. It did however say nothing about why people do not want to participate in VOM.
One explanation for this could be the different coping mechanisms victims can have. Maybe for
some victims VOM would be a suitable coping mechanism. However some victims are for
example more inclined to withdraw (Frieze, Hymer & Greenberg, 1987). Another explanation
could be that the victims in this research had to choose for VOM almost immediately after they
were exposed to the crime. The initial reaction of victims to robbery crimes are feeling weak,
frightened, helpless or out of control (Frieze et. al., 1987). Victims may not be ready for effective
coping such as VOM. Probably because victims need to get out of that initial state first before they
can cope with the crime through VOM. Results could have been different if the victims in this
research had more time before asking them to participate.
Against expectations the need to restore the feelings of agency did not predict participation
in VOM. One explanation for this is that a victim first need a message of empowerment, before
their willingness to reconcile is increased (Shnabel & Nadler, 2008). In this research victims did
not get a message of empowerment before they had to choose whether they wanted to participate
in VOM. If this message was given before they had to choose, results could have been different
and this need could have predicted the willingness to participate.
The effects of fear and the estimation of the insincerity of the offender
This research also examined the effects of the feelings of fear and the estimation of the insincerity
of the offender on the relation between the needs and the willingness to participate and the
preference of richness. The need for information is still an important factor in the choice for the
communication channel in VOM. The prediction of the emotional need seems to be weaker,
because it disappears. This means that the feelings of fear and the estimation of the insincerity of
the offender are more important factors in considering participation in VOM. However the effect
of fear is against expectations. According to the literature fear decreases the willingness to
participate in VOM (Wemmers & Cyr, 2004), but in this research the opposite seems true.
However, according to foregoing experimental research wherein people had to imagine being a
26
victim, fear also positively predicted participation in VOM (Gröbe, 2013). This indicates that fear
has a different prediction in choosing a communication channel in VOM for real victims and
people who imagine being victims.
The need for agency also positively predicted the willingness to participate. If people have
a higher need for agency they prefer a richer form of communication. An explanation could be that
when people experience feelings of fear caused by the offender, they think the offender has power
over them. They can decide to participate in VOM because their need to restore the feelings of
agency became a stronger prediction. However analysis did not show this interaction. Again it
might be that with real victims this interaction is apparent, because the prediction of fear is
different from people who image being a victim.
The effects of the apology
This research was the first to examine the effects of an apology given through different online
communication channels on the feelings of fear and anger. It seems that an apology perceived as
richer, causes a greater decline in the feelings of fear and anger, because the apology is also
perceived as more sincere. This is in accordance with the findings of Choi and Severson (2009)
who concluded that apologies were not experienced as sincere because of the lack of nonverbal
cues. It also explains why Zebel (2012) found that face-to-face mediation had a better effect on the
feelings of anger than letter exchange. Face-to-face mediation is probably perceived as more rich,
because it contains both verbal and nonverbal cues. Zebel (2012) found that when people
participated through face-to-face mediation it has a positive effect on both the feelings of fear and
anger. When people participated through letter mediation it only had an effect on the feelings of
fear. This suggests that victims experience face-to-face mediation as more sincere than people who
participate through letter exchange mediation, because of the lack of cues in letter exchange
mediation.
What is also noteworthy is that participants in this research judged the apology on richness.
The rating of the participants was not accordance with how the channels are seen as rich according
to the richness approach (Swaab et. al., 2012). According to the richness approach face-to-face
communication is most rich, but according to participants in this research video calling was seen
as most rich. An explanation for this could be the expectations that people have. As mentioned
before there was no synchronous communication in this research. When people choose face-to-
face mediation they expected someone across the table with whom they could communicate
directly. However all the saw was a videotape of the offender offering his apology. People who
choose video calling also saw a videotape, but this is more in accordance with real video calling.
Because the expectations were different, people who choose face-to-face communication might
have experienced it as less rich in contrast to people who choose video calling even though the
message and the way it was shown was the same. It is thus important to prepare the victim, so he
has the right expectations and he is not disappointed by the way he has contact with the offender.
It would be very interesting to examine the effects of expectations victims have on the effects
mediation has.
27
The effect of involuntary participation
Because this research exposed some participants involuntary to mediation it was interesting to see
what the effects were. It seemed that when people involuntary participated the effects of VOM
were smaller, because they perceived the apology as less sincere. This was not in line with the
expectations and existing literature. According to Swaab et. al., (2008) if people with a
noncooperative orientation use a rich form of communication during a negotiation, it has negative
effects on the outcome. It was expected that victims who were involuntary exposed to mediation
had a noncooperative orientation, mediation would have a negative effect on the feelings of anger
and fear. There could be multiple explanations why this was not the case. First of all the research
of Swaab et. al., (2008) was not conducted in the setting of VOM. The theory thus may not be
applicable to the context of VOM. Second it was not explicitly asked or examined if the victims
who were involuntary exposed had a noncooperative orientation, it was an assumption. It could
have been that these people had other reasons for nonparticipation then a noncooperative
orientation towards the offender. It could be for example that a victim just did not think that
mediation would be a good way for him to cope with the crime or he or she was not ready yet. It
could also be that a victim was too scared to participate, but that this did not mean that he or she
had a noncooperative orientation. However even though the results might not be negative it would
not be ethically right to expose people to the mediation process involuntary, because it might have
damaging effects to some persons, especially when it comes to real victims.
Limitations
An important limitation of this study were the participants who were not real victims but had to
image they were a victim. They thus had to guess what their emotions were and how they would
feel and this is a hard thing to do. This means they could have under- but also overestimated their
feelings and needs. This could have had an effect on the choice for mediation and on the effects of
the apology. This has also an effect for the generalizability. This research cannot be generalized to
the victim population because the research did not contain real victims. However all the different
options of communication have been chosen in this research. This might be an indication that there
is a need for more and new communication channels in the mediation process. Besides the
limitation of this research design, it has also a huge advantage. Most research about VOM use a
comparison between victims and offenders that voluntary participate and a control-group. This
means that there is no random selection and the research might be biased, because the victims and
offenders that participate are more motivated which make the outcomes more positive than they
really are (Latimer et. al., 2005). Latimer et. al., (2005) call this the self-selection bias. Within this
research a comparison could be made between victims who voluntary and who involuntary
participated. Latimer et. al., (2005) recommend a new research manner by asking the motivations
of victims before participation in VOM, to compare the different groups. The research design of
this study made this possible and also showed the concerns of Latimer et. al., (2015). When people
are less motivated the effects of mediation are not as good as for people who are very motivated
to participate in VOM. However this does not mean that other studies saying that mediation has
28
very good effects are wrong. In the mediation process the victims must voluntary participate. This
means that probably most of the victims that do participate are very motivated. But this does not
bias the effects of mediation, because people who are not motivated to participate will probably
not participate. This means that mediation will have the positive effects that can be found in the
literature. The positive effects might be weakened if persons participate that are not as motivated.
It is thus important to make sure that victims participating do that voluntary, because that causes
the best effects.
What also could be a limitation of this study is that there was no real mediation, because
of the use of an online questionnaire. The apology used in this research could be one part of
mediation, but the process consists of much more. However this study is the first to examine new
communication channels in the context of mediation and the effects of an apology given and the
results are already very promising. It could be that when using a real mediation process, which
contains real communication, the results are even stronger. There was also an advantage of the use
of an online questionnaire. A lot of people participated in the study which make the outcomes more
valid. When you have to depend on participation in real cases it is very hard to get the amount of
participants as were used in this research.
What is also a limitation is that there is not asked for the educational background of the
participants. It is very likely that persons with a social background are more willing to meet
offenders face-to-face to talk things over. This might explain the high percentage of people who
wanted (face-to-face) mediation in this research. It is now hard to conclude if this high participation
rate is due to the fact that people could choose from more options or that is due to the background
of the participants.
Implications
This research is a big step for future research in the context of VOM. It shows that there are some
needs, such as the need for information, which predict participation in VOM. Practitioners in the
field of VOM can keep these needs in mind when offering the choice of mediation towards the
victim, so he can explain in what way mediation can help the victim fulfilling his needs.
This research also showed that a richer form of communication has better effects on the
feelings of fear and anger and that these richer forms of communication could be online
communication. This is a promising result for the practical field of VOM. Some parties decline
face-to-face mediation because it might be to confronting, but an indirect way of mediation – such
as letter exchange- does not have the same effects as face-to-face mediation (Zebel, 2012) because
it is not as rich. In this research video calling was seen as a rich form of mediation and this means
that is has a comparable effect on the feelings of anger and fear as face-to-face mediation13. This
means that for example video calling could be used as alternative for face-to-face mediation. This
might make the confrontation less frightening because it is not a direct form of communication,
but the effects can be the same as face-to-face mediation, which makes it the best of both worlds.
13 In this research video calling was even seen as richer than face-to-face mediation
29
One recommendation would be to apply these new forms of communication into the practical field
and introduce it to a small population of victims and offenders to see what the effects are (see also
Zebel, 2016). However before applying it to real victims and offenders it is recommended to first
conduct a study similar to this, but with people imaging being the offender (see also Zebel, 2016).
In this way the effect for offenders can be examined to see if it has the same promising effects as
it has for victims. It is also advisable to use a study design that allows direct contact and
synchronous communication which was not possible in this research.
To end this research with a practical recommendation that can be used based on this
research, it can be said that every victim has its own needs and feelings. It is important for a
practitioner to keep this in mind when offering options for mediation. Be clear in what every
channel contains and what the victim can expect. If the mediation is according to the expectations
of the victim, he probably perceives it as richer and thus more sincere which has better effects on
the feelings of fear and anger. In this way a practitioner can make sure that the victims gets what
he needs. It is also very important to make sure that a victim participates on voluntary basis,
because these victims might be more motivated which causes mediation to have better effects.
Especially when a victim has to comply in the needs of the offender and it is not possible to use
the form of communication he or she prefers, it is important that a victim deciding to participate
in a communication form other than his or her preference, he or she does this on a full voluntary
basis. So to make sure that mediation has the best effects for the victim it is important that he or
she has the information to make a confident voluntary choice to participate and that the
expectations are met.
30
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Front page
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33
Appendices Appendix A: Screenshot of every communication form
Face-to-face
Video calling
34
Shuttle mediation
Chatting
35
Letter:
36
Appendix B: Example of the questionnaire Beste respondent,
Fijn dat je mee wilt werken aan dit onderzoek. Dit is een masteropdracht binnen de vakgroep Psychologie Conflict,
Risico en Veiligheid van de Universiteit Twente. In dit onderzoek staat slachtoffer-dader bemiddeling centraal.
Slachtoffer-daderbemiddeling is bemiddeling die wordt aangeboden aan slachtoffers en daders van misdrijven en
verkeersongevallen, zodat zij elkaar vragen kunnen stellen over het misdrijf, de motieven en gevolgen ervan. Dit kan
beide partijen helpen bij het verwerken van het misdrijf. Er zal straks een situatie beschreven worden. Er wordt
aan jou gevraagd of je je zo goed mogelijk wilt inleven in deze situatie, waarin jij een slachtofferrol hebt. Verder
worden er een aantal vragen gesteld via een enquête. Het onderzoek richt zich op verschillende
communicatievormen. Het is hierom van belang dat je geluid en video's goed kunt afspelen tijdens het invullen van
het onderzoek. Deelname aan dit onderzoek zal ongeveer 15 minuten duren. Het is belangrijk dat je de vragen
naar waarheid invult. Er zijn geen goede en foute antwoorden. Om je resultaten te gebruiken voor het onderzoek is
het van belang dat je de vragenlijst volledig en in een keer invult. Wanneer je stopt met het invullen van de
vragenlijst, zullen je antwoorden verloren gaan. Deelname is volledig anoniem, je mag ten alle tijden stoppen en de
resultaten worden alleen gebruikt voor dit onderzoek. Mocht je vragen hebben kun je contact opnemen. Alvast
bedankt voor je tijd en voor je hulp.
Met vriendelijke groet, Jiska van Dijk [email protected]
Toestemmingsverklaring:Ik verklaar dat ik op een voor mij duidelijke manier ben ingelicht over de aard en methode
van dit onderzoek. Ik stem geheel vrijwillig in met deelname aan dit onderzoek en ik heb daarbij het recht deze
instemming ten alle tijde terug te trekken. Ik weet dat ik elk moment mag stoppen met deelname en ik weet dat de
gegevens en resultaten van dit onderzoek anoniem en vertrouwelijk worden verwerkt. Als mijn resultaten gebruikt
worden voor wetenschappelijke publicaties of op een andere manier openbaar worden gemaakt, zal dit volledig
anoniem gebeuren. Mijn persoonsgegevens worden niet door derden ingezien zonder mijn uitdrukkelijke
toestemming. Akkoord:
Ja
Nee
Voordat het onderzoek begint, willen we je eerst enkele algemene vragen stellen.
Wat is je geslacht?
Man
Vrouw
Wat is je leeftijd in jaren?
37
Wat is je nationaliteit
Nederlands
Duits
Anders namelijk; ____________________
Ben je ooit slachtoffer geweest van een misdrijf?
Ja (Kun je aangeven om wat voor een misdrijf het ging?) ____________________
Nee
Ken je iemand in je directe omgeving (familie of vrienden) die ooit slachtoffer was van een misdrijf?
Ja (Kun je aangeven om wat voor een misdrijf het ging?) ____________________
Nee
Heb je zelf ooit een misdrijf gepleegd?
Ja (Kun je aangeven om wat voor een misdrijf het ging?) ____________________
Nee
Ken je iemand in je directe omgeving (familie of vrienden) die ooit een misdrijf heeft gepleegd?
Ja (Kun je aangeven om wat voor een misdrijf het ging?) ____________________
Nee
Er volgt zo dadelijk een scenario, waarin we je vragen je zo goed mogelijk in te leven. In het scenario wordt een
overval gepleegd, waarvan jij het slachtoffer bent. Lees het scenario zorgvuldig door, want als je eenmaal begint met
het invullen van de vragenlijst kun je niet terugkeren naar het scenario.
Stel je voor, het is vrijdagavond en je wilt nog even wat geld pinnen voordat je straks naar de stad gaat. Terwijl je
naar de pinautomaat loopt, zie je dat het rustig is op straat en je gaat met een gerust gevoel pinnen. Je pakt het geld
uit de automaat en doet dit in je portemonnee. Dan hoor je ineens geschreeuw en voel je een harde dreun tegen je
hoofd. Je wankelt en ziet een man een pistool op je richten. Hij schreeuwt dat hij het geld wil. Je ziet geen andere
mogelijkheid dan je geld af te staan. De dader rent weg. Je blijft geschrokken achter en je voelt dat er bloed langs je
gezicht loopt. Je hebt een wond aan je hoofd. Na de overval voel je je bang en je bent oplettender. Enige tijd later
heeft de politie op basis van je verklaring de dader weten op te pakken. De dader is veroordeeld.
38
Als ik als slachtoffer twee weken later zou terugdenken aan het misdrijf zou ik mij ... voelen
Heel erg oneens
Oneens Enigszins oneens
Neutraal Enigszins eens
Eens Heel erg eens
Nerveus
Rusteloos
Paniekerig
Onzeker
Gespannen
Als ik als slachtoffer twee weken later zou terugdenken aan de dader zou ik mij ... voelen
Heel erg oneens
Oneens Enigszins oneens
Neutraal Enigszins eens
Eens Heel erg eens
Boos
Woedend
Kwaad
Nijdig
Gefrustreerd
Nerveus
Rusteloos
Paniekerig
Onzeker
Gespannen
39
Als jij slachtoffer bent geweest in de beschreven situatie, in welke mate zou jij twee weken na het misdrijf het gevoel
hebben dat...
Heel erg oneens
Oneens Enigszins oneens
Neutraal Enigszins eens
Eens Heel erg eens
Je moeilijk kunt omgaan met de uitdagingen in het leven?
Je moeite hebt met het oplossen van dagelijkse problemen?
Je controle hebt over dingen die je overkomen in het leven?
40
In welke mate zou je na de overval behoefte hebben aan:
Heel erg oneens
Oneens Enigszins oneens
Neutraal Enigszins eens
Eens Heel erg eens
De dader bewust maken van de consequenties van zijn daden?
Ervoor zorgen dat de dader niet in herhaling valt?
De dader bewust maken van de pijn die hij jou heeft aangedaan?
De dader bewust maken van zijn verantwoordelijkheid?
Informatie van de dader over zijn achtergrond?
Informatie van de dader over het delict?
Informatie van de dader over zijn motief achter het delict?
Het ontvangen van een excuus van de dader?
Het uitpraten van de gebeurtenis met de dader?
Een ontmoeting met de dader?
Het afsluiten van de gebeurtenis?
Een plek geven van de gebeurtenis?
Het verwerken van de gebeurtenis?
41
Nadat de dader veroordeeld is, neemt een bemiddelaar vanuit slachtoffer in beeld contact met je op. Deze
bemiddelaar vertelt je dat de dader graag bemiddeld contact met je wilt hebben. Hij legt je het volgende over
bemiddeld contact uit:
Slachtoffer-daderbemiddeling wordt aangeboden door de stichting Slachtoffer in Beeld. Het gaat om vrijwillig
contact tussen het slachtoffer en de dader. Na het misdrijf kan u als slachtoffer te maken krijgen met verschillende
emoties zoals woede, angst of onmacht. Het kan moeilijk zijn om met deze emoties om te gaan en het misdrijf achter
u te laten. Het contact met de dader kan u helpen bij deze verwerking. Door contact met de dader kunt u vragen
stellen en aan de dader vertellen wat de impact is geweest van de gebeurtenis. Dit kan uw angst en woede
wegnemen en voorkomen dat de dader in de toekomst opnieuw in de fout gaat. Een professionele bemiddelaar zal
het contact begeleiden en probeert de wensen, behoeften en verwachtingen van beide partijen in kaart te brengen
en op elkaar af te stemmen. Er zijn verschillende manieren waarop u contact kunt hebben met de dader, zoals een
gesprek, brief uitwisseling of videobellen. Samen met de bemiddelaar kunt u bespreken wat uw wensen zijn en welke
vorm van contact mogelijk is. Bemiddeling is kosteloos.
De dader heeft aangegeven dat hij graag bemiddeld contact met je wil hebben, omdat hij worstelt met wat hij
gedaan heeft en hij wil graag zijn excuses wil aanbieden. In welke mate heb jij het gevoel dat:
Heel erg oneens
Oneens Enigszins oneens
Neutraal Enigszins eens
Eens Heel erg eens
De dader oprecht contact met je wil hebben?
Wat de dader tegen je gaat zeggen oprecht zal zijn?
De dader contact met jou wil, voor jouw welzijn?
42
De bemiddelaar vertelt je dat er verschillende manieren zijn waarop jij contact kan hebben met de dader:
Gesprek: Bij een gesprek zit je met de dader en de bemiddelaar aan tafel en heb je face-to-face contact met
de elkaar. Dit vindt plaats op een veilige plaats, zoals het politiebureau. Je kunt in alle rust met elkaar praten. Tijdens
het gesprek is er een bemiddelaar aanwezig, die jullie helpt in het gesprek.
Video bellen: Je hebt een gesprek met de dader via een beveiligd communicatiesysteem (vergelijkbaar met Skype).
Zowel jij, de dader alsook de bemiddelaar zitten achter een computer. Je kunt direct op elkaar reageren en je ziet
elkaar, maar je zit niet in dezelfde ruimte. Er is een bemiddelaar aanwezig bij zowel de dader als bij jou, zodat hij kan
ingrijpen in het proces.
Chatting: Dit is een tekst dialoog. Jij en de dader sturen elkaar verschillen tekstberichten via een
communicatiesysteem (zoals een chatprogramma). Het is het verzenden van berichten waarbij direct op elkaar
gereageerd wordt. Hierbij is de persoon niet zichtbaar, alleen de geschreven teksten. De bemiddelaar is ook ingelogd
in het systeem, zodat hij kan ingrijpen in het proces.
Email uitwisseling: Jij en de dader hebben contact met elkaar door het uitwisselen van emails, waarin vragen gesteld
kunnen worden. De andere partij beantwoord deze email, door een email terug te schrijven. Dit gaat vaak sneller
dan briefuitwisseling, omdat emails minder lang onderweg zijn, om bij de andere partij te komen. De bemiddelaar
leest de emails ook, zodat hij kan ingrijpen in het proces .
Brief uitwisseling: Jij en de dader hebben contact met elkaar door het uitwisselen van brieven, waarin vragen gesteld
kunnen worden. De andere partij beantwoord deze brief, door een brief terug te schrijven. Dit gaat minder snel dan
e-mails uitwisselen, omdat het voor brieven enige tijd duurt om bij de andere partij te komen. De bemiddelaar leest
de brieven ook, zodat hij kan ingrijpen in het proces.
Pendeling: Jij en de dader hebben contact via de bemiddelaar. De dader geeft informatie aan de bemiddelaar en
deze vertelt het aan jou. Jij kan hier vervolgens op reageren en eventuele vragen stellen en de bemiddelaar geeft
deze informatie door aan de dader. De dader en het slachtoffer zijn dus niet opdezelfde plek aanwezig.
Zou jij als slachtoffer in deze situatie bemiddeld contact willen hebben en zo ja, op welke manier het liefst?
Nee, ik wil geen bemiddeld contact
Ja, ik wil graag een gesprek
Ja, ik wil graag video bellen
Ja, ik wil graag chatten
Ja, ik wil graag emails uitwisselen
Ja, ik wil graag brieven uitwisselen
Ja, ik wil graag een pendelgesprek
43
Jij en de dader hebben allebei gekozen voor bemiddeling. De dader uit het scenario zal jou zo een excuus geven, via
een chat. Neem deze goed in je op en houd goed in gedachten dat het ontvangen van een excuus een van de
onderdelen is van een chatgesprek. Naderhand willen we je een aantal vragen stellen omtrent het aangeboden
excuus.
Or (if someone choose no)
Jij hebt aangegeven geen bemiddeld contact te willen hebben met de dader. Toch zijn we benieuwd hoe jij zou
reageren op een excuus van de dader, genaamd Jasper, als je wel contact zou hebben met hem. Daarom laten we je
zo een excuus zien van deze dader. Neem deze goed in je op en houd goed in gedachten dat het ontvangen van een
excuus een van de onderdelen is van bemiddeld contact. Naderhand willen we je een aantal vragen stellen omtrent
het aangeboden excuus.
44
Wat vond jij van deze manier van communiceren?
Heel erg oneens
Oneens Enigszins oneens
Neutraal Enigszins eens
Eens Heel erg eens
Ik twijfel of de hoeveelheid informatie die ik verkreeg voldoende was
Ik ben tevreden met de informatie die ik kreeg vanuit de dader
Ik kon een goed beeld vormen van wat de dader wilde overbrengen
Ik vond het moeilijk in te schatten of ik begreep wat de dader wilde overbrengen.
Ik twijfel over wat de dader precies wilde duidelijke maken met zijn excuus
In welke mate ben je het eens met de volgende stellingen?
45
Heel erg oneens
Oneens Enigszins oneens
Neutraal Enigszins eens
Eens Heel erg eens
Ik twijfel of het excuus oprecht was
Ik kan niet goed inschatten of het excuus gemeend was
Ik twijfel of de dader oprecht tegen mij was
Ik heb het gevoel dat de dader eerlijk tegen mij was
Ik heb het gevoel dat de dader verantwoordelijkheid neemt voor zijn daden
Ik twijfel of de dader zich verantwoordelijk voelt voor zijn daden
Ik heb het gevoel dat de dader wil vermijden dat hij verantwoordelijk gehouden wordt voor zijn daden
Ik heb het gevoel dat de dader geraakt is door de gevolgen die zijn daden hebben gehad
Ik twijfel of de dader emotioneel lijdt door de gevolgen van zijn daden
Ik denk dat de dader emotioneel gegrepen is door de gevolgen van zijn daden
Ik denk dat de dader gemotiveerd is om ervoor te zorgen dat hij zijn daden niet herhaald
Ik twijfel of de dader nogmaals de fout ingaat
Ik heb het gevoel dat de dader in de toekomst wil voorkomen dat hij de fout ingaat
46
We zijn erg benieuwd hoe jij je voelt na het bemiddelde contact. Als ik als slachtoffer na het bemiddeld
contact terugdenk aan het misdrijf zou ik mij ... voelen
Heel erg oneens
Oneens Enigszins oneens
Neutraal Enigszins eens
Eens Heel erg eens
Nerveus
Rusteloos
Paniekerig
Onzeker
Gespannen
Als ik als slachtoffer na het bemiddeld contact terugdenk aan de dader zou ik mij ... voelen
Heel erg oneens
Oneens Enigszins oneens
Neutraal Enigszins eens
Eens Heel erg eens
Boos
Woedend
Kwaad
Nijdig
Gefrustreerd
Nerveus
Rusteloos
Paniekerig
Onzeker
Gespannen
47
Ten slotte willen we je nog een aantal vragen stellen over deelname aan deze studie. We verzoeken u om deze
vragen zo eerlijk mogelijk te beantwoorden omdat dit ons helpt de waarde van dit onderzoek beter in te schatten.
Heel erg oneens
Oneens Enigszins oneens
Neutraal Enigszins eens
Eens Heel erg eens
Ik kon mij goed inleven in de slachtofferrol
Ik kan me voorstellen dat een gelijksoortige situatie mij zou kunnen overkomen
Hoeveel energie heeft u in het inleven van het scenario gestopt?
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Zeer weinig:Zeer veel
Hoe zorgvuldig heeft u de vragen gelezen?
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Zeer onzorgvuldig:Zeer zorgvuldig
48
Werd u tijdens deze studie afgeleid? Geeft u hieronder a.u.b. aan welke afleidingen van toepassing waren.
Geen afleiding
Het lezen van E-mail
Bezoek van een Sociale Media website
Bezoek van een andere website
Telefoon gechekt en/of beantwoord
Televisie stond op de achtergrond aan
Muziek stond op de achtergrond aan
Gestoord door een ander persson
Er was een andere afleiding die hier niet bij staat
(Optioneel). We zouden het waarderen als u nog feedback heeft over deze studie. Als u een reactie wilt geven over
het onderwerp van de studie, de studie zelf, of het scenario kunt u dat hieronder doen.
Het onderzoek is nu afgelopen. Bedankt voor het meewerken. Dit onderzoek had twee doelen. Allereerst de relaties
bekijken tussen de behoeften die slachtoffers hebben na een misdrijf en hun voorkeur voor communicatievorm
tijdens slachtoffer-daderbemiddeling en daadwerkelijke deelname. Het tweede doel van dit onderzoek was bekijken
welke effecten een excuus heeft, gegeven door middel van de verschillende communicatievormen. Nogmaals
hartelijk dan voor je deelname!
Jiska van Dijk
Mocht je interesse hebben in de uitkomsten van het onderzoek, dan kun je hieronder je emailadres achterlaten. Hij
wordt uitsluitend gebruikt om de uitkomsten van het onderzoek op te sturen.
Mocht je je hebben ingeschreven via SONA, dan kun je hieronder je 5-cijferige id-code achterlaten, zodat je credits
worden toegekend
49
Appendix C: Multinomial regression analysis to compare all the different communication
channels
It was looked if there was a specific order in which the needs determine which communication
channel people prefer. However as can be seen in the table below, there is no straightforward order
or way in which the needs determine which communication channel is preferred. It partly confirms
the findings of the other multinomial regression analysis. When people choose the rich forms of
communication – face-to-face and video calling- they have higher informational and emotional
needs. The effect of emotional need is also apparent by letter or email exchange. The effect of
emotional need is not apparent for people choosing chatting.
Communication channel Need B SE Exp(b) p
Face-to-face Agency .01 .19 1.01 .95
Information .37 .15 1.44 .01
Emotional .85 .18 2.34 <.005
Mentally cope .28 .21 1.33 .18
Video calling Agency .06 .30 1.07 .84
Information .27 .23 1.31 .24
Emotional .48 .28 1.62 .08
Mentally cope .35 .36 1.42 .33
Chatting Agency .34 .27 1.40 .21
Information .61 .23 1.83 .008
Emotional -.14 .26 .87 .60
Mentally cope .04 .26 1.04 .89
Letter or email exchange Agency -.17 .22 .84 .43
Information .24 .18 1.27 .18
Emotional .48 .22 1.62 .03
Mentally cope -.27 .23 .76 .24
Shuttle mediation Agency .12 .25 1.12 .64
Information .30 .20 1.35 .12
Emotional .10 .24 1.10 .69
Mentally cope .11 .27 1.12 .68